They All Ended With a Kiss
by Waldo
Summary: Five Season 2 episodes and the kisses that should have followed.
1. Duet

**Title**: They All Ended with a Kiss: #1 - Duet  
**Author**: Waldo.  
**Pairing**: Sheppard/Beckett  
**Rating**: PG

Carson was working quietly in the infirmary late in the evening. He wasn't hiding. At least that was what he told himself. He'd released Rodney and Cadman a few hours ago. This time even Rodney seemed eager to escape the infirmary and get to the solitude of his own quarters and the knowledge that if he fell asleep there, he'd wake up there too.

Carson, for his part, was still getting cat-calls and all manner of suggestive remarks as he made his way through the Atlantis halls. So there he was, reorganizing the medicine lock-ups long after most of the city had had dinner and were on their way to whatever evening diversions they had planned.

He wasn't prepared for a strong hand to grip him by the shoulder and spin him around. Being skittish by nature and even more wound up than normal that day in particular, he took no notice of who had grabbed him by the lapels of his lab coat and pulled him in for a rather passionate kiss, so when his fist came back, he didn't have time to pull his punch.

"Oh shit! Carson! What the hell!"

Carson stepped back, hands over his face, mortified. "Oh god. Oh god ohgodohgod." He moved back in, pulling hands down from a damaged face. "I'm so sorry. John, I had no idea who… You scared the life out of me!" He probed the rapidly bruising skin on John's cheek. "Sit here," he sighed, indicating one of the beds as he went to retrieve an ice pack.

John flinched as the cold pack stung his face. "Of course it's me. Do you normally have random men coming up and kissing you?"

Carson had turned to grab a cloth to wrap the ice pack in, he stopped mid-motion and turned back to John with a murderous look on his face. "Very funny," he said with a look that said he clearly thought it was anything but.

John raised an eyebrow and shrugged in apology.

Carson put a towel around the ice pack and handed it back to John. "Just what did you think you were doing anyway? Sneaking up on people like that."

John gave him a cocky grin. "Trying to figure out what Rodney's glitch is."

"And by kissing me, you think you can figure out what's wrong with Rodney?" Carson was clearly at a loss.

"Yeah, I think maybe some wires got crossed when Cadman got shoved in there with him."

Carson crossed his arms and leaned back on the bed opposite the one John was perched on and waited for him to elaborate.

"I mean, did you see the look on his face this morning? Something is seriously wrong with any guy who makes that kind of face after kissing you."

Carson could feel himself blushing. It had taken getting hit for John to deliver his sneaky compliment, but he'd persevered. Carson supposed that was one of the reasons he was so in love with the man.


	2. Conversion

**Title**: They All Ended with a Kiss #2 - Conversion  
**Author**: Waldo  
**Pairing**: Sheppard/Beckett  
**Rating**: PG

He figured they all thought he was asleep. Or that the Iratus bug aspects of him were still in charge. In either case, they'd be wrong. He'd been having periodic bouts of wakefulness and lucidity in the last two or three of the twelve hours since Ronon had carried him back through the gate. Twelve hours of being delirious and pissed about being restrained as he listened to Carson and his people run around and somehow convert Iratus bug eggs into something that would make him human again.

He'd had his first two treatments and Carson seemed extremely optimistic, if exhausted. Carson had checked on him one last time, telling him that he was going to get him some juice and then go get a few hours sleep and letting him know that his team was waiting outside.

John had shrugged in a 'whatever' way when Carson asked if he should send them in.

So he lay there listening to Carson explain that the reversion would be slow, but would definitely happen. He heard Rodney call medicine 'voodoo' once again, and he heard Carson's terse reply.

A few minutes later Carson came back with some apple juice. John drank about half of the little cup when Carson carefully elevated his head and then leaned back. As Carson turned to walk away, John caught his hand and held it. He looked down to where their hands were joined, and began to pull back his green-gray scaly hand. Carson turned his hand to capture John's again, squeezing to let him know that the exo-skeletal skin didn't unnerve him.

"You should just hit him," John said quietly.

"Excuse me?" Carson asked, seeming quite confused, and possibly a little affronted.

"Rodney. You should just blacken his eye or loosen a few teeth the next time he degrades what you do." Needless to say, John was feeling a bit protective of Carson and his skills that day. And something about the Iratus genes tended to make him more violent than he was naturally. Though, he was reasonably sure that in this case, he'd be advocating a little violence Iratus genes or no. For someone who spent as much time in the infirmary as Rodney did, for someone who made a critical case out of every paper cut or hang nail, he had no respect for medicine or its practitioners, and John found it utterly unacceptable.

"Don't think it hasn't crossed my mind," Carson told him with a soft smile as he gently stroked John's hair. "But then I'd just have to treat him and listen to him piss and moan on top of him already being an ungrateful bastard."

John tugged on their joined hands until he could bring it to his lips and kiss Carson's knuckles softly. "You should do it anyway."


	3. Grace Under Pressure

**Title**: They All Ended with a Kiss #3 - Grace Under Pressure  
**Author**: Waldo.  
**Pairing**: Sheppard/Beckett  
**Rating**: PG

John was reasonably certain Carson wouldn't be leaving the infirmary that night unless it caught fire.

He resigned himself to sleeping alone, but he wasn't about to do it without getting a kiss good-night first. It sounded ridiculous when he phrased it to himself that way, like they were two kids in high school or something, but silly or not, he headed down to the infirmary.

He'd only been released a few hours ago himself. He and Radek had managed to maintain proper pressure throughout the entire endeavor, but Carson had insisted on keeping an eye on them for a few hours just to be sure. Rodney had done something with his jumper's cranky controls that had put him at risk for depressurization issues, but so far some forethought on the part of the Ancients or possibly the simple assistance of the patron saint of obnoxious physicists had kept the most severe symptoms Carson had expected at bay. Rodney had been cold, hypoglycemic and bordering on a wicked case of adrenaline poisoning when they pulled him out, but Carson said he wasn't in any serious danger.

When John swung around the corner to the main ward, he found Carson idly poking at his computer by desk lamp in the corner. Rodney had apparently been drugged or finally exhausted himself into a deep sleep and John could hear him snoring from across the room.

As he crossed the ward Carson looked up. John didn't want to break the near silence of the infirmary at night so he nodded towards Carson's office. Carson saved his work and followed John.

"How is he?" John asked quietly as the door hissed shut.

"Obnoxious as ever," Carson said with less humor than John was used to.

"He give you a rough time after I left?" John hooked his arms around Carson's waist and pulled him in.

Looking tired and worn, Carson leaned on him gratefully for a minute. Normally he wasn't given to public displays, even in a closed office, but tonight he was too tired not to take solace where it was offered. "Not me."

John rubbed his hands up and down Carson's back in soothing strokes. "He go at Dr. Zelenka?" He frowned. Rodney wouldn't pull any verbal punches if he had decided that since Radek oversaw the jumpers that Rodney's crashing had been his fault. Radek was timid enough, he didn't need Rodney jumping on his ass every time something bad happened.

"Aye, and the poor lad just stood there and took it. It's going to take a little while before they're on speaking terms again."

"You work on Radek, I'll get Rodney to apologize." It wasn't the first time they'd tag teamed the two of them after one of Rodney's outbursts. "Do I have any chance of getting you to hand Rodney over to your excellent nursing staff and getting you to come to bed?" John changed the subject.

Carson frowned at him. "I still can't understand how he avoided getting The Bends. I just want to keep an eye on him a little longer."

"You mean until you fall asleep on your computer and your staff kicks you out," John clarified.

Carson just shrugged.

"I had to try," John said pulling back far enough to look Carson in the eyes. He never pushed when Carson said he had to work late. For one, it was petty. He might have a high school-type hang up about getting a good-night kiss, but he wasn't about to go complaining when someone else needed Carson's attention. And for two, they both took their work incredibly seriously. He understood the kind of dedication Carson had to the lives under his care. It was one of the few things their jobs had in common.

Carson grinned. "You should get some sleep. It's been a long day for you."

"Yeah, I was just headed home. I wanted to come in and see if I could get you out of here, or if not, to say good-night."

Carson looked towards the door, a split-second of indecision on his face. "I really should keep an eye on Rodney."

"I know," John said, smiling. He pulled Carson back in, on hand moving up to cradle the back of his head and he leaned down to give him a slow, deep kiss.

Carson returned to kiss, echoing John's intensity. His hands came up to John's shoulders holding his biceps. After a moment he pulled back and rested his forehead on John's chest. "Hold that thought until tomorrow night, will you?"

John laughed quietly. "You got it. Go check on whale-bait in there. I'll see you some time tomorrow."

Carson smiled before returning to the ward, somehow feeling much more awake than he had a few minutes ago.


	4. The Long Goodbye

**Title**: They All Ended with a Kiss #4 – The Long Good-bye  
**Author**: Waldo.  
**Pairing**: Sheppard/Beckett  
**Rating**: PG

John had been watching Carson carefully ever since he woke up and found himself… himself again.

Carson was a reasonable man and John was sure that when he saw Elizabeth grabbing him and kissing the daylights out of him that he had understood that it had been neither him nor Elizabeth in control at that point.

For which he was extremely grateful. Kissing Elizabeth… it wasn't something he'd ever spent a lot of time contemplating, but now that he had… sort of… it wasn't something he ever wanted to do again. Not that Elizabeth was unattractive or had bad breath or anything, but he'd never really seen her as sexual before. And the kiss had been god-awful… all mashing lips and clanking teeth…

He shook his head to clear it. He really didn't want to think about it.

The real downside, he decided, was that he'd never again be able to tease Carson about Laura Cadman abducting Rodney's face to kiss Carson. Carson had way better ammunition on that front now.

Still… Carson had been awfully cold and professional when he'd come around to check on him. John sighed. That was to be expected. Carson wasn't given to public displays in the first place, and in the second place John was now his patient and it wouldn't do at all for him to seem to be abusing that position. Especially with Caldwell lurking about looking for reasons to steal John's job.

He poked at his Palm Pilot with renewed vigor killing the little alien things that were falling out of the sky in the video game he'd conned a lieutenant on the _Daedalus_ into bringing for him after their last run home.

An hour and a half after Carson's last check, where he'd taken both his and Elizabeth's pulses and 'hmm'd at their monitors, a nurse came in with their clothes. She handed Elizabeth hers and then gestured to Carson's office with John's. "You can get dressed in there."

John hoped that was a good sign. He hopped off the bed and grabbed his clothes. He was still a little tired and his wrists were sore where the restraints had held him during the seizure, but he was feeling pretty good for someone who'd just been hijacked and run all over the damn city.

He knocked on the closed office door and waited until Carson let him in. The door whooshed open and John was presented with Carson's back. He waited a second, but Carson didn't turn to greet him. "Uh… hi. Kelly said I could change in here while Elizbeth got dressed…" he pointed out into the hall, trailing off as he realized he still had Carson's back and there didn't seem to be any pressing work keeping him that way, "… out there."

He waited a minute to see if Carson would acknowledge him. He was seriously starting to worry that there was going to be a fight over what those two hijackers had done while in his body. He sighed and decided to get it over with. "Look, I know after Mara I promised to never… but you know that wasn't me! That was those intergalactic space hussies! I mean, seriously… Elizabeth? Do you really think I'd –" he cut himself off as he saw Carson's shoulders shake. "Hey, you're laughing!"

He took a long relieved breath before spinning Carson around and kissing him soundly. He flinched as Carson's cold hands slid under the loose back of the scrub top, but didn't stop kissing him until he needed to come up for air. And when he did, he smiled down into Carson's eyes. "Bastard."

"I believe it's a Klingon saying," Carson said with an evil smile. "Revenge is a dish best served cold." Carson kissed him again. "I better not hear another word about Laura Cadman."

John released him and stripped off the scrub pants and pulled on his own boxers. Carson leaned on his desk, watching. Under other circumstances John might not have a problem with that – there was certainly nothing there Carson hadn't seen before in any number of circumstances – but he got the feeling the discussion wasn't over.

"So… was she any good at it?"

"It?" John asked, hoping that Carson wasn't asking what John was sure he was asking.

"Kissing," Carson said slowly as if John were a slow child or someone with a concussion.

John rolled his eyes at him, "No. Actually, no she – which ever 'she' it was – had to have been the worst kisser on the face of the planet. You are so much better."

Carson smiled. "Good answer."


	5. Coup D'Etat

**Title**: They All Ended with a Kiss #5 – Coup D'Etat  
**Author**: infosmallwaldo  
**Pairing**: Sheppard/Beckett  
**Rating**: PG

With word spreading that Carson could cure most of the radiation sickness cases suffered by the Genii; the infirmary had quickly filled.

Carson had been going for almost three days straight, diagnosing cases, setting up treatment plans, performing surgeries and arranging palliative care for the most afflicted. When he was literally swaying on his feet from exhaustion, Dr. Biro had taken drastic measures. She'd called Colonel Sheppard and told him to get Carson out of the infirmary for at least twelve hours. At gunpoint if necessary.

So John had come down and collected him. Actually threatening to use his side-arm after the fifth 'one last thing' he needed to check.

Assuming that if he'd been neglecting sleep, he'd also been neglecting food, John steered him to the mess. Radek Zelenka – who was still avoiding Rodney as much as humanly possible – and Teyla had joined them. Helping John keep Carson awake so that he could eat his soup and avoid an embarrassing face-plant in it.

Once he'd gotten some soup and half a plate of salad into him, John excused them both and walked Carson home.

When the door to John's quarters opened, Carson stood there looking confused. "I don't live here," he said simply, his brain shutting down now that he was no longer actively using it.

"If you listen to enough rumors you do," John answered _sotto voce_. He propelled Carson inside with a hand in the small of his back. "If you think I'm letting you out of my sight for the next twelve hours, you're crazy. Dr. Biro threatened me with large bore needles weilded mercilessly. And she doesn't give a damn if my ass is sore later."

Carson turned back to him, stunned. "She said that?"

John grinned at the mortified look on his face, "Not all of it," he said laughing. John went to the dresser and grabbed a pair of Carson's pajama bottoms and a t-shirt. "Here, get changed."

John had to catch him a few times as he tripped himself up on his own clothes, but once he was changed, John was able to get him tucked between the sheets with minimum fuss.

As he pulled the blankets up around him, Carson caught his hand. "Aren't you coming to bed?"

John leaned down and kissed his forehead softly. "It's two in the afternoon," he explained quietly.

"I suppose the fact that I need to ask two o'clock on what day is somewhat telling, isn't it?" Carson asked as he turned on his side, making himself comfortable.

John tucked the blankets around him. "Very," he answered, but he wasn't sure that Carson had even heard him.


End file.
